Response to elections to set course for Obama

by Anne E. Kornblut - Nov. 3, 2010 12:00 AMWashington Post

Having promised as a candidate to bring change to Washington, President Barack Obama got a heavy dose of it himself on Tuesday night.

As Democrats suffered heavy losses nationwide, evidence mounted that the election was at least in part a repudiation of the president. More than one-third of voters said they cast their ballots as a statement of opposition to Obama, substantially more than the number that said they voted to support him, according to early exit polls. A clear majority of all voters - more than half - said they disapproved of his performance as president, although disapproval of Congress was even higher.

In some states, Obama watched his efforts to campaign on behalf of candidates fail. Among the most personal losses for the president was that of Rep. Tom Perriello of Virginia, whose defeat came just four days after Obama made a special trip to the congressman's Charlottesville district, the president's only such visit for a House member, to attempt a last-minute rescue.

In West Virginia, by contrast, Democratic Gov. Joe Manchin won the Senate race, despite Obama's 69 percent disapproval rating in the state, after the president stayed out of the state.

How Obama chooses to respond to Tuesday's losses - whether he seeks a meaningful truce with newly emboldened Republicans, or stands firm in his policies and hopes they overreach - will set the course for the remainder of his term. His strategy will unfold rapidly in the days ahead, starting today, when he holds an afternoon news conference in the East Room to discuss the 2010 election results.

If history is any guide, he will make pronouncements with lasting significance: Bill Clinton, after the Democrats suffered major losses in 1994, called on Republican leaders to "to join me in the center of the public debate," a remark that later allowed him to successfully cast the new GOP majority as extreme.

George W. Bush, after seeing Republican gains in 2002, used his first post-midterm news conference to call on both parties to bring a "spirit of bipartisan cooperation to the urgent task of protecting our country from the ongoing threat of terrorist attack," an appeal that presaged the invasion of Iraq.

Until now, Obama has offered few clues about his approach to managing either a diminished or disappeared majority. Earlier Tuesday, with the leadership roles of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in doubt, it was not even clear who would make up the immediate face of the Democratic Party starting Friday, when Obama leaves town for an extended trip to Asia.

Upon his return Nov. 15, Obama has immediate goals, including seeking a bipartisan deal on whether to extend the soon-to-expire Bush tax cuts and acting on a report from his deficit commission due out at the beginning of December.